Orange 5 gear problems

[Blakeatron]

Had my 2014 orange 5 maybe 4 months now.

When in the little ring and bigger gears it always skipped so i couldnt use them. All other gears were fine.
As i am getting quicker on the climbs i was getting more frustrated at them not being there.
The lbs have now shortened the chain by 3 links and the all the gears in ring 1 and 2 are now perfect and i can really power down.
But now on big ring i have lost the bigger gears - the chain is too short.

They have said that you should never use the full opposite gears and all full suss bikes will have a few gears that dont work!?!

I feel like i have been fobbed off and that all gears should be able to work, or am i wrong? I am slightly tempted to stick a link back in and see what happens - but i dont have a chain tool...!

It has slx gears front and back, clutched on the rear.

[numtumfutunch]

I dont use the extremes on any of my bikes although I understand SRAM say you can with their new off road double chainsets

Coincidentally a pal was demonstrating just this when he sheared off his rear mech!

[Engineer1]

Full diagonals in either direction isn't ideal or advised specially as some of the ratios are repeated.

[yellowjack]

I don't mean this to sound rude, but I can't think of any other way to say this...

With extremes of gearing, inside to outside chain line is asking too much of a mechanical system. It has it's limits.

If you are on large/large or small/small rings, (presuming it's a triple at the front) you should consider moving across to the middle ring, and learning where your 'duplicate' ratios are.

If you have a 3 x 10 you have, on paper, 30 'different' gears. In reality, certain combinations of chainring and rear cassette 'cogs' are duplicated on another chainring. Use the one with the straighter chain line, and be prepared to manage your gear selection to obtain maximum efficiency.

The 30 gears you have are more like a truck gearbox, than a car gearbox. You won't see increasing ratios in a straight line through all 30, you actually have 10 gears and a low/standard/high ratio box like an old school four wheel drive system. You haven't been 'fobbed off'. You just need to appreciate the limits of your gearing and learn to use it more efficiently. Asking it to operate at the extremes will only cause you frustration and a bill for replacement when components wear prematurely.

[ndg]

They have set it up with the chain too short. It may not like cross gear running, but it should do it. My double set up certainly doez.

[AlmostUseful]

Out of interest, was the B Limit screw set properly? If the upper jockey wheel of the rear mech wasn't set properly it will skip gears. Shouldn't need to shorten a chain.

[matt-ITR]

All the gears should work, so you have a case to go back to the LBS, especially if they have chopped your chain too short as that is a really basic mistake to make.

Echo the above though, try not to use big chainring and biggest cassette cog and smallest chainring and smallest cog.